<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>Ripples Over Water by liketreesinnovember</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29089260">Ripples Over Water</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/liketreesinnovember/pseuds/liketreesinnovember'>liketreesinnovember</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Avatar: The Last Airbender</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Episode: s03e14-15 The Boiling Rock, Gen, Hakoda (Avatar) is a Good Parent, Hurt Zuko (Avatar), Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Iroh (Avatar) is a Good Uncle, Minor Sokka/Suki, Post-Canon</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-01-30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-01-30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 11:55:40</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,128</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29089260</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/liketreesinnovember/pseuds/liketreesinnovember</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Hakoda meets Zuko, and learns some things, and has a conversation with Iroh.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Hakoda &amp; Iroh (Avatar), Hakoda &amp; Sokka (Avatar), Hakoda &amp; Zuko (Avatar), Iroh &amp; Zuko (Avatar)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>7</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>461</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>I think of you as my own</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Ripples Over Water</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>"That boy has been hurt badly by someone."</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>General Iroh's face betrays nothing, his gold eyes flashing. "That </span>
  <em>
    <span>boy</span>
  </em>
  <span> is the Fire Lord," is the stony reply. Then the general's face allows itself to betray a twinge of emotion, although Hakoda is not sure what name to give it. "And yes, he has."</span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>Not long after they had left the cursed sight of that prison on the boiling lake, Hakoda notices the slight tremble in the boy's shoulders, and recognizes the beginnings of hypothermia. Sokka is talking and talking of war balloons and the Avatar, and meteors, showing Hakoda the long, smooth, dark blade, made of some mysterious material that seems to draw the light away from it. Hakoda is fascinated, and charmed, and thankful to the stars to be here, with his son, instead of in that awful prison.</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>The girl, Suki, listens intently to his son's every word, and Hakoda can sense the love between them. He recalls his own courtship of Kya, so long ago. These children have also known loss, he knows, but that they had found their way back to each other is another blessing.</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>But the Fire Nation Prince is sitting slightly away from them, huddled against the far wall with his knees pulled up to his chest. Every time Sokka made some comment about his part in their journey, the boy would nod, when his input was required, but otherwise he did not speak.</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>The prince had shown skill, and resourcefulness. From the way the ragged prison uniform he wore hung loosely on his frame, Hakoda realized that he was probably only around Sokka's age. The boy stared at them with amber eyes of fire, until Sokka's tale was interrupted by the sudden intrusion of Prince Zuko tilting to one side and collapsing in a heap.</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <span>"If he must inherit a throne of blood, perhaps he will make something of it. He's brave, and smart, and good."</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>"This I know," the General replies solemnly.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>They work quickly to get him warm, wrapping him in whatever blankets and extra garments they can find on the ship. Sokka tells about the cooler, and about how the boy had breathed smoke and fire.</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>"He's a firebender, I thought - I mean he seemed…" Sokka turns to his father with wide eyes. It is not his fault, but Hakoda knows that his son will blame himself anyway.</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>"Yes, I'm aware that they can do that. It allows them to control their internal temperature for a time, but it is like a man running at a breakneck speed through the snow. He cannot keep it up forever."</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>"Why didn't he tell us, dad?"</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>Hakoda begins to form some answers.</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>"I'm sorry," the boys says, in between chattering teeth. "I tried to - to do what uncle taught me, but it - wasn't good enough - I wasn't - "</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>"What you can do now is rest," Hakoda says firmly, pressing him down to lie amidst the bundle of blankets, and Prince Zuko closes his mouth abruptly, or tries to, teeth still chattering violently. Hakoda senses his unease at being cared for. It is more than simply a young man's bravado, more than what he knows of how soldiers are trained in the Fire Nation, as if they do not feel pain. The boy is incredibly ill but not willing to admit anything but apologies, as if afraid some retribution would come down on him for doing so. Perhaps it had, in the past.</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Hakoda takes a step forward.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>"And his love for you knows no bounds."</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The General betrays something else at that, closes his sun-bright eyes, then opens them again. "I love him as well. As if he were my own." This time, Hakoda senses a bit of a challenge in the words.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>Hakoda does not like hearing the boy talk about his family. Once he had gotten past the strangeness of having the Prince of the Fire Nation sitting around a campfire with his children, and once the boy had actually begun to talk about things other than a curt "yes" or "no" when he was spoken to, Hakoda hears things which he would have found alarming, if he hadn't reminded himself who Zuko was.</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>He talks often about his uncle. Uncle Iroh. As in General Iroh, Dragon of the West, once Crown Prince Iroh, leader of the siege of Ba Sing Se that lasted six hundred days, before a final, bloody battle had put an end to it. The boy speaks of one of the most violent men Hakoda had had the displeasure to have known about as if he were a kindly grandfather, and alternates between that and the immense guilt that Hakoda recognized when the boy had apologized to him, before. Hakoda imagines his own son, his daughter, growing up among such men.</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>"You don't owe them anything, you know," Hakoda says to Zuko one day, when he manages to catch the boy alone. "Your uncle...I know you think you need to find him and apologize, but…"</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>The boy looks at him, and his eyes widen. Those gold eyes that were like the eyes of a wolf dog, now looking like nothing but a lost, scared child.</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>"No," Zuko says, his voice rising with sudden fierceness, "that's not, that's not how it is. I know, I know what my father did was wrong." There is anger there, a simmering rage that seems at odds with the boy's usual taciturn demeanor. The anger is not for him, Hakoda understands. "I know that now. But my uncle, he took care of me. Like you took care of me, on the ship. Uncle was the one who took care of me after…"</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>Again the prince shuts his mouth, his words trailing away as if stolen, the fire dying as quickly as if it had been snuffed out, but his distress is clear. His eyes watch Hakoda.</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>"It's okay, son," Hakoda says, slowly, and the boy seems startled, uncertain. The look reminds him of a foxhare he had seen once, caught in a metal trap. "I apologize, Prince Zuko, for the assumption I made."</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>He holds out his hand, and Zuko stares at it for a moment before taking it. Despite the vulnerability the boy had shown only a moment before, his grip is strong, and he looks Hakoda in the eye as his fingers curl determinedly around his own. He seems to have decided something.</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <span>"I needed to see if that love was misplaced."</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The old general smiles sadly. "And what did you determine, Chief Hakoda of the Southern Water Tribe?"</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>"That we can never know whether the actions we take to keep our children safe are the right ones. We may only hope they learn from our mistakes."</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
</body>
</html>